


My Name Is

by WhitethornWolf



Category: Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-11 12:49:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11148756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhitethornWolf/pseuds/WhitethornWolf
Summary: You've heard the drill. The Yeerks are here, and humanity's only hope lies in five kids and an Andalite warrior cadet, all with the power to morph.That was the situation -- up until now.





	My Name Is

**Author's Note:**

> A prequel to a slightly silly, self-indulgent fic I've been working on for 10 years.  
> Bear with me.
> 
> A slight AU, in which the timeline is now the 21st century.

My name is Courtney.

 

I guess I’m pretty normal. I’m okay looking, not really tall or short. If you spotted me on the street you’d see nothing more than a girl with frizzy hair and headphones practically attached to her head. If you looked closer I’d probably be the first to break eye contact.

I go to school. I do stuff with my family. I do my homework at the last possible minute, and I’ll do chores when my dad nags at me. Regular, every day stuff -- except now, I can’t tell you my last name or where I live. It feels weird to say out loud, but I’m not normal any longer. Nothing is normal any longer. And I have to be careful, because if they find me…

 

Well, I won’t be _dead_. But dying isn’t the worst thing that could happen.

 

I can already tell what you must be thinking. I know I sound crazy... but the truth is, we’re not alone in the universe. We’re not even halfway down the food chain in the universe.

You’d think it would be cool to find out life exists on other planets millions of light years away...but not these aliens. They’re not cute and quirky like E.T. You can’t wrap them in a blanket and stick them in your bike basket. They don’t shuffle around on stumpy legs and phone home with their fingers.

 

I should know. I’ve met one.

 

Picture this -- Tuesday night dance class in the school auditorium. A bunch of girls from all over the school, some of them in my year. Hanging out, dancing together, having fun with no judgement or competition.

My teacher, Miss Hernandez, caught me as I was packing up my stuff. She’s one of those people who almost seem ageless; she could be nineteen or twenty-nine for all I knew. As far as teachers went she was pretty cool.

“Hey,” she said while I pulled my socks on. “I noticed you were a little bouncy tonight. Don’t forget to keep your movements soft and flowing, okay?”

That was one thing I liked about her. She found a way to give criticism without putting you down about it.

 

The truth is, I was pretty buzzed that day, so I knew it wouldn’t happen again. Dance and theatre is kind of my life. When something’s that important, you spend a lot of time working on it.

And I’d just been cast in the school musical, so you know, the work paid off. But I didn’t tell Miss Hernandez that. I accepted the feedback, said goodbye to some of the other kids and left.

 

The first thing I noticed when I went outside was the streak of black smoke that cut through the red-orange sunset.

A forest fire was my first guess, but the smoke came from a cluster of buildings about half a block away. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Some idiot left the stove on, I figured.

By the time I reached the highway I was beginning to think there’d been some sort of accident or explosion. Peak hour traffic is normal where I live, but the cars were backed up at least five miles in both directions. That, and police and fire trucks were weaving through the lines of cars and driving across the median strips. There was no way to cut across like I normally did without getting run over or picked up for jaywalking.

 

“Oh, man,” I complained to myself.

My place is a little farther out from most kids at my school, nearer the farms that border the national forest than the suburbs. There’s a strip of land that runs right past the back of my house, and I usually walk straight across the highway and pick through that strip of land. It’s pretty safe to walk through in daylight and there’s usually no-one around.

 

This time I had to double back through a couple parking lots and side streets to find away around the highway. By the time I finally hit that strip of forest it was getting dark, and I was pretty nervous...so when I heard the sound of someone barfing, I admit I hesitated before checking it out. But then like the well-meaning idiot I am, I kept walking towards the sound. I figured if someone was throwing up they could probably use some help.

 

I hadn’t gone far when I spotted a woman on her hands and knees on the ground, with...well, I said I heard puking, so you can use your imagination to fill in the rest. She looked messed up, like she’d been running. Her black hair was full of leaves and twigs, and she was sweating like she’d just run a marathon.

And she was wearing a tarpaulin.

 

Yeah, a tarpaulin, as in the plastic sheet you use to cover things. Only it was covering her, and thankfully it wasn’t transparent. Oh, and she had no shoes.

Definitely been hitting the tequila; that’s what I thought at first. But she also looked pretty freaked out. She kept turning her head from side to side, like she expected someone to come jumping out of the woods at any moment. She mentioned people ‘tracking’ her. I offered to call someone, but she refused. Then she stood up and --

 

I don’t really know how to describe it. Her body began to bulge in random places and sort of melt or blur, like she’d had a bad lunch or...well, I had no other explanation.

I should have known then to run home and pretend like it was a funny story. Hey Mom, Dad, guess what kind of whacko I met in the woods?

 

Then a pair of legs exploded out of her stomach.

That would have been enough to make me run screaming, but I couldn’t move. It was like an invisible hand pinned me to the spot and made me watch the most incredible, bizarre, creepiest thing I’d ever seen in my life.

She turned purple. I’m talking like Violet Beauregarde, only I’m pretty sure the Oompa Loompas weren’t about to pop out behind her and start singing.

 

_Schloop!_

Her hair sucked right back into her head. Her butt began to grow, longer and longer, then a tail burst from it.

 

“Oh, wow,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say. “Wow.”

 

<Please do not be frightened.>

 

I felt an insane urge to giggle. Frightened? Some woman I thought was a drunk turned into an alien in front of me. A purple, four legged centaur with four eyes and a tail.

My brain decided to catch up with me, and I suddenly realised I hadn’t heard it - her, I think - speak. Not exactly. I guess I heard it in my head.

I had to say something. If I didn’t I would probably start screaming and never stop.

 

“You know, this is definitely the weirdest thing that’s happened to me all week.”

 

The alien looked puzzled, but seemed to brush it off. She stepped towards me.

I flinched. I couldn’t help it. I thought at first she looked kind of harmless -- until I caught sight of the tail rising over her back, and the blade attached to it.

That was not cute. Or harmless.

 

The alien held her hands out with her palms up, same as I had just before.

 

<I will not harm you,> she said. <I need your help. I need a place to hide.>

 

I laughed, a little hysterically. My eyes went to her tail. “From who? Can’t you just slice’n’dice them?”

 

I guess the alien didn’t get human jokes. She didn’t laugh. One of the stalks on her head twisted around and pointed at the sky. The other eyes stayed on me. It was definitely weird.

 

<Not exactly,> she said. <There are too many, and they have a ship. They may be tracking me.>

 

“Huh? Who’s _they?_ The police?”

 

<No, not your authorities.> She looked impatient and distracted, like I was annoying her. I was too afraid to be offended. <I have no time to explain. I would be safe to talk if I could conceal myself, but I mustn’t be seen.>

 

I laughed again. “No offense, lady, but you’re a purple alien. You're kind of obvious.”

 

She blinked at me with her big green eyes, and I forgot about my fear and surprise for a second when I realised she was shaking. I could see her hands -- her weird, many-fingered, tiny little hands - trembling, and her legs looked like they would give way any second.

I don’t know why that made me relax a little. I guess I thought if aliens ever paid Earth a visit they would be too advanced for emotions I thought were only human. Or maybe it made me less wary to realise for all the natural defenses this alien seemed to have, she could feel something as relatable as fear.

 

<Please,> she said.

 

I took a deep breath.

 

“Okay,” I said. “I can help you.”

 

What else could I do?

 

 


End file.
